The incident with Professor Gates and Policeman Crowley (about which the President said the police handled the arrest of a Harvard professor “stupidly”) raised a lot of good discussion about racism and respect. But I thought one particular piece was missing from the discussion: the importance of Connecting with Empathy, Attention and Respect when someone is treating you disrespectfully – no matter who you are.
The newspapers carried stories about how various police officers would have handled the situation. Some experienced officers said that if a citizen becomes disrespectful to a police officer, it is appropriate for the officer to arrest them. Others said that if a citizen becomes disrespectful, but are not committing any other offense, then the officer should just walk away from the situation. Some refined the situation, and said that if other people are present, then the officer has to maintain control of the situation and arrest the citizen who is being disrespectful or “disorderly” in their speech.
On the other hand, there are those who say that the professor was within his rights to be disrespectful to a police officer, because the incident took place inside the professor’s home. After all, a man’s home is his “castle.” Also, African-Americans have been singled out for years in the past by police in inappropriate stops when they are walking, driving (“driving while black”), and engaged in other routine activities for which whites are rarely stopped. Professor Gates had just returned from a trip and was probably tired. But he also was an African-American who teaches about racism and apparently felt disrespected by a white police officer.
I can certainly understand and empathize with the concerns of each person in this situation. But, as former General Colin Powell said, you have to “suck it up.” The key point is one that “It’s not about you when you’re personally attacked.” It’s about whatever’s going on for the other person – whether they have a high conflict personality or just had a bad day.
At our High Conflict Institute seminars we teach “Connecting with Empathy, Attention and Respect,” as a method of responding to personal attacks. We have exercises that professionals practice to respond to increasingly personal verbal attacks by clients with high conflict personalities. Perhaps this should be required for everyone.
“Wow, I can see you’re really upset. Sounds like you’re having a hard day. Let’s see what WE can do to solve this problem.” It takes practice to respond to someone who is treating you disrespectfully this way, but it is possible. As high conflict personalities increase in our society (and there is evidence this is happening), we will all be better off if professionals – such as professors and police officers – can practice calming people down, not just responding to disrespect with more disrespect or an arrest. Calming people down should be our goal. We need to practice connecting with people more and criticizing them less.
In this regard, I must commend the President, Professor, and the Policeman on how calmly they have addressed this issue after the fact. As President Obama said, it was a poor choice of words on his part. The ability to reflect and learn from mistakes – and make changes – will help us all.
[Connecting with Empathy, Attention and Respect is Tip #8 in Bill Eddy’s book “It’s All YOUR Fault!” 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others for Everything (2008), available from High Conflict Institute.com.]
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
What (Not Who) Killed Michael Jackson
In the media frenzy about finding who to blame for Michael Jackson’s death, I got to thinking about personality development (you know me: “can’t stop till I get enough”) and the influence of our culture on who he became. I remember him as a young child as the lead singer for the Jackson Five in the 1970’s. Seeing those early TV clips now brings back memories of his total enthusiasm for singing and dancing. Hearing his Thriller album again brought back the optimism of the early 1980’s. I was the Director of the Seattle University Child Care Center at the time, and when the kids hesitated to eat their vegetables we used to joyfully sing with them “Eat it, Eat it!” to his song Beat It.
What went wrong for Michael? I think he absorbed some cultural traits that seeped into his personality development and contributed to his death. He was driven. There are many reports of him being an abused child. As with many abused kids, he wanted to be someone else. He created an image of himself and tried to live it in a way that few people can even try. It seemed that he wanted to be what counted in our culture: being white, forever young and forever a star. He fought reality in a way that only a star with millions of dollars can indulge. Instead of learning to live with life’s limits, he went over the top challenging them.
He’s a handsome man on the cover of his Thriller album – reportedly the largest selling album of all time. Soon after that his appearance started to change. His nose. His skin color. It seemed that he was becoming white, although he always denied it and said that his skin suffered from a rare condition.
MTV before Jackson was quite white. Ironically, he is credited with opening it up for black performers. Too bad he couldn’t continue with his success as a handsome African-American man. But if you were in his shoes and had gazillion bucks in this culture, what would you try to do? Especially if you were an abused kid with an image of yourself in the mainstream culture you were trying to fulfill?
Michael never had a childhood. His father pushed him and his siblings to perform, starting out poor in Indiana and ending up with huge wealth in Los Angeles. He was the lead singer of the Jackson Five from at least 6 or 7 years old, if not before. He didn’t seem to have normal playmates of his age, to just hang out with and fool around with. His brothers were older and he was always working and traveling. In a recent interview with Quincy Jones, he was described as a studious performer – always studying what others were doing and trying out new moves. He invented the Moonwalk. (I still have no idea how he did that – going backwards while he appears to be walking forward!) He put dance troupes into rock videos. He seemed to be a perfectionist.
But he also was a man-child. He often dressed in clothes like a character out of a children’s movie, with a fake-military jacket, etc. He spoke in a child’s voice. He created the Neverland Ranch (like Peter Pan) and invited young children to share it with him. He invited them to share his bed too, and went on national TV saying that this was just fine to do. I can imagine him, still a “child” himself, thinking that this was totally innocent. He ran away to Europe and Japan, where he was still a star. For the last decade or so, he was viewed skeptically as a possible child abuser and very eccentric (“Wacko Jacko”) in the U.S.
Jackson died at 50, while working very hard at making a comeback. He created his own title in the 1980’s: The King of Pop. He was going to show the world: This is It! (the title of his tour). He was apparently heavily in debt, from living beyond even his means. He had a reputation as a spender. He seemed to be still driven - trying to fulfill an image of being someone who looked wealthier and more successful than even he was. Now he was going to prove to the world (and himself?) that he was still a star. Apparently, he was so driven and stressed that he couldn’t sleep. He did what only a superstar can apparently do – paid for a sleep treatment that would not have been available to anyone else. If news reports are true, the primary cause of his death may have been an anesthetic which is not a sleep aid and only to be used in hospitals, where its high risks can be carefully managed.
He died trying too hard to get enough – in a culture that seems to always demand more.
[Bill Eddy is an attorney, psychotherapist, and the author of “It’s All YOUR Fault!” 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others for Everything (2008), available from High Conflict Institute.com.]
What went wrong for Michael? I think he absorbed some cultural traits that seeped into his personality development and contributed to his death. He was driven. There are many reports of him being an abused child. As with many abused kids, he wanted to be someone else. He created an image of himself and tried to live it in a way that few people can even try. It seemed that he wanted to be what counted in our culture: being white, forever young and forever a star. He fought reality in a way that only a star with millions of dollars can indulge. Instead of learning to live with life’s limits, he went over the top challenging them.
He’s a handsome man on the cover of his Thriller album – reportedly the largest selling album of all time. Soon after that his appearance started to change. His nose. His skin color. It seemed that he was becoming white, although he always denied it and said that his skin suffered from a rare condition.
MTV before Jackson was quite white. Ironically, he is credited with opening it up for black performers. Too bad he couldn’t continue with his success as a handsome African-American man. But if you were in his shoes and had gazillion bucks in this culture, what would you try to do? Especially if you were an abused kid with an image of yourself in the mainstream culture you were trying to fulfill?
Michael never had a childhood. His father pushed him and his siblings to perform, starting out poor in Indiana and ending up with huge wealth in Los Angeles. He was the lead singer of the Jackson Five from at least 6 or 7 years old, if not before. He didn’t seem to have normal playmates of his age, to just hang out with and fool around with. His brothers were older and he was always working and traveling. In a recent interview with Quincy Jones, he was described as a studious performer – always studying what others were doing and trying out new moves. He invented the Moonwalk. (I still have no idea how he did that – going backwards while he appears to be walking forward!) He put dance troupes into rock videos. He seemed to be a perfectionist.
But he also was a man-child. He often dressed in clothes like a character out of a children’s movie, with a fake-military jacket, etc. He spoke in a child’s voice. He created the Neverland Ranch (like Peter Pan) and invited young children to share it with him. He invited them to share his bed too, and went on national TV saying that this was just fine to do. I can imagine him, still a “child” himself, thinking that this was totally innocent. He ran away to Europe and Japan, where he was still a star. For the last decade or so, he was viewed skeptically as a possible child abuser and very eccentric (“Wacko Jacko”) in the U.S.
Jackson died at 50, while working very hard at making a comeback. He created his own title in the 1980’s: The King of Pop. He was going to show the world: This is It! (the title of his tour). He was apparently heavily in debt, from living beyond even his means. He had a reputation as a spender. He seemed to be still driven - trying to fulfill an image of being someone who looked wealthier and more successful than even he was. Now he was going to prove to the world (and himself?) that he was still a star. Apparently, he was so driven and stressed that he couldn’t sleep. He did what only a superstar can apparently do – paid for a sleep treatment that would not have been available to anyone else. If news reports are true, the primary cause of his death may have been an anesthetic which is not a sleep aid and only to be used in hospitals, where its high risks can be carefully managed.
He died trying too hard to get enough – in a culture that seems to always demand more.
[Bill Eddy is an attorney, psychotherapist, and the author of “It’s All YOUR Fault!” 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others for Everything (2008), available from High Conflict Institute.com.]
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Time to Calm the Alienation Debate
I just got back after a 7-day speaking trip ranging from New Orleans (state bar family law section), to Indianapolis (federal hearings officers for employment disputes), and Calgary, Canada (police conference for handling community complaints). High conflict people (HCPs) are popping up more and more in the workplace, community and family disputes – around the world!
After ten years of studying and speaking about this subject, it is gratifying to know that more and more people are recognizing high conflict dynamics and starting to realize that it is a personality matter, rather than something unique to the “issues” in their field of work. It is gratifying to meet so many professionals who “get it” and are really trying to calm and contain HCPs, rather than just criticizing them and allowing them to escalate their high-conflict behavior.
But we have a long way to go, as most professionals and ordinary people still react to HCPs in ways that often make things worse. For example, while I was in Canada, “parental alienation” was front-page news. There have been several high-profile Canadian divorce cases in the past two months in which the courts have changed custody from an “alienating” parent to the other parent in order to stop a “campaign of vengefulness” toward the “target” of the alienation. In some cases, when custody was changed the children were ordered to attend family therapy in the United States in what some called a “deprogramming” center.
Professionals and parents were strongly split over these decisions. Those who see parental alienation as a large problem lauded the judges for taking a brave position and upholding the importance of children having two parents. The “Parental Alienation Syndrome” theory goes back 20 years and was put forth by Richard Gardner, who said that it was intentional behavior by a custodial parent to win an advantage in court. In fact, about 200 lawyers, parents and psychologists attended Canada’s first international conference last month on parental alienation. They say the problem is growing and needs strong action.
On the other hand, many professionals and parents blasted these decisions. Some professionals and parents believe the theory that a rejected parent may be abusing the children, so that the courts were turning over a traumatized child to the source of the trauma. They have termed “parental alienation syndrome” as “junk science” or “voodoo science,” and claim that changing custody to the rejected parent is “torture,” “kidnapping,” or “Orwellian interference.” In a sense, they see a child’s resistance to spending time with one parent as realistic estrangement, and the parent must accept it because of their own bad behavior.
I have trouble with both theories. As a family law attorney for 16 years, I have had many cases in which children resisted contact with a parent – sometimes it’s dad, but sometimes it’s mom; sometimes they resist the non-custodial parent, but sometimes they intensely dislike their custodial parent. In other words, I see alienation - but not as a predictable syndrome. Most parents I have seen engage in “alienating” behavior are unaware of it or driven by an irrational sense of desperation – not a family court strategy. On the other hand, as a clinical social worker for 12 years, I have seen many abuse cases. But I don’t see resisting an abusive parent as very common. More common is loving the parent, but not the abuse. Abused children don’t usually feel empowered to “hate” an abusive parent and to display anger toward them – as “alienated” children often do. Battling over which theory is correct is part of the problem, as I see it.
I believe in a family systems and high conflict personality-based theory of alienation: HCPs lack self-awareness. HCPs lack the skills to stop themselves, and lack the skills to change their dysfunctional behavior. They lack emotional boundaries. So when family members and professionals argue heatedly over who is at “fault,” their emotions are highly contagious. They spill over onto the children, who have learned how to cope with a high conflict parent(s). An all-or-nothing solution is often the way their calm down their parent(s). Alienation is an all-or-nothing solution, which fits right into the family dynamics. Even when it is only one parent who engages in high conflict behavior, the other parent has often learned to cope by giving in to the HCP’s all-or-nothing solutions to calm down the HCP. In other words, the blaming and all-or-nothing thinking that typically characterizes these cases – by family members and professionals – are part of the problem, not part of the solution. These parent need to develop the abilities that they can, and research is showing that some HCPs can change their behavior by teaching them small skills in small steps with lots of validation.
For example, in a case in British Columbia, the court stated that the mother had been “resourceful, highly manipulative, and untruthful.” In another case, in Ontario, the judge gave standing to the 18-year-old son to seek custody of his younger brothers, stating he was trying to “shame the parents” into seeing the effects of their own behavior. The trouble with this is: if these parents are HCPs, emotional criticism doesn’t give them insight, it increases their bad behavior, transfers directly to their children, and escalates the bad behavior of other HCP parents hearing these statements.
The best way to deal with potential or existing alienation or abuse is to teach potentially high conflict parents protective skills at the front end of a court case: flexible thinking, managed emotions, and moderate behaviors. At High Conflict Institute we are developing an approach to do exactly this called “New Ways for Families.” It focuses on teaching these skills to both parents in a context of validation for both parents from the start of the case, rather than shame and blame for one or both. (For more on this method, see the article this month in our eNewsletter.)
Interestingly, the day I left Calgary, a front-page article on the newspaper told the end (perhaps) of the case involving the 18-year-old son. Apparently in December, his younger brothers had refused to go to the family counseling center in the U.S. and had been temporarily put into a psychiatric hospital, then into a foster home. Then, in the past two weeks, the 18-year-old helped his parents negotiate a settlement. He blamed the professionals for making the situation worse. So did many of the bloggers.
It’s time to recognize that HCPs need skills and not blame. They also needs lots of structure and consequences. But small consequences designed to keep them focused on their own skills, rather than the other’s bad behavior. Yes, in some cases larger consequences may be necessary for bad behavior – abuse and/or alienation. But let’s be clear first on whether we are doing more harm than good. In most cases we should first exhaust efforts to teach both parents these basic skills, before dramatically excluding either parent from their children’s lives. It’s time that professionals learned how to calm down and contain these disputes – as early as possible – so that we’re part of the solution, not part of the problem.
*News information for this article was gathered from March and April issues of the Canadian “Globe and Mail,” and the “National Post.”
After ten years of studying and speaking about this subject, it is gratifying to know that more and more people are recognizing high conflict dynamics and starting to realize that it is a personality matter, rather than something unique to the “issues” in their field of work. It is gratifying to meet so many professionals who “get it” and are really trying to calm and contain HCPs, rather than just criticizing them and allowing them to escalate their high-conflict behavior.
But we have a long way to go, as most professionals and ordinary people still react to HCPs in ways that often make things worse. For example, while I was in Canada, “parental alienation” was front-page news. There have been several high-profile Canadian divorce cases in the past two months in which the courts have changed custody from an “alienating” parent to the other parent in order to stop a “campaign of vengefulness” toward the “target” of the alienation. In some cases, when custody was changed the children were ordered to attend family therapy in the United States in what some called a “deprogramming” center.
Professionals and parents were strongly split over these decisions. Those who see parental alienation as a large problem lauded the judges for taking a brave position and upholding the importance of children having two parents. The “Parental Alienation Syndrome” theory goes back 20 years and was put forth by Richard Gardner, who said that it was intentional behavior by a custodial parent to win an advantage in court. In fact, about 200 lawyers, parents and psychologists attended Canada’s first international conference last month on parental alienation. They say the problem is growing and needs strong action.
On the other hand, many professionals and parents blasted these decisions. Some professionals and parents believe the theory that a rejected parent may be abusing the children, so that the courts were turning over a traumatized child to the source of the trauma. They have termed “parental alienation syndrome” as “junk science” or “voodoo science,” and claim that changing custody to the rejected parent is “torture,” “kidnapping,” or “Orwellian interference.” In a sense, they see a child’s resistance to spending time with one parent as realistic estrangement, and the parent must accept it because of their own bad behavior.
I have trouble with both theories. As a family law attorney for 16 years, I have had many cases in which children resisted contact with a parent – sometimes it’s dad, but sometimes it’s mom; sometimes they resist the non-custodial parent, but sometimes they intensely dislike their custodial parent. In other words, I see alienation - but not as a predictable syndrome. Most parents I have seen engage in “alienating” behavior are unaware of it or driven by an irrational sense of desperation – not a family court strategy. On the other hand, as a clinical social worker for 12 years, I have seen many abuse cases. But I don’t see resisting an abusive parent as very common. More common is loving the parent, but not the abuse. Abused children don’t usually feel empowered to “hate” an abusive parent and to display anger toward them – as “alienated” children often do. Battling over which theory is correct is part of the problem, as I see it.
I believe in a family systems and high conflict personality-based theory of alienation: HCPs lack self-awareness. HCPs lack the skills to stop themselves, and lack the skills to change their dysfunctional behavior. They lack emotional boundaries. So when family members and professionals argue heatedly over who is at “fault,” their emotions are highly contagious. They spill over onto the children, who have learned how to cope with a high conflict parent(s). An all-or-nothing solution is often the way their calm down their parent(s). Alienation is an all-or-nothing solution, which fits right into the family dynamics. Even when it is only one parent who engages in high conflict behavior, the other parent has often learned to cope by giving in to the HCP’s all-or-nothing solutions to calm down the HCP. In other words, the blaming and all-or-nothing thinking that typically characterizes these cases – by family members and professionals – are part of the problem, not part of the solution. These parent need to develop the abilities that they can, and research is showing that some HCPs can change their behavior by teaching them small skills in small steps with lots of validation.
For example, in a case in British Columbia, the court stated that the mother had been “resourceful, highly manipulative, and untruthful.” In another case, in Ontario, the judge gave standing to the 18-year-old son to seek custody of his younger brothers, stating he was trying to “shame the parents” into seeing the effects of their own behavior. The trouble with this is: if these parents are HCPs, emotional criticism doesn’t give them insight, it increases their bad behavior, transfers directly to their children, and escalates the bad behavior of other HCP parents hearing these statements.
The best way to deal with potential or existing alienation or abuse is to teach potentially high conflict parents protective skills at the front end of a court case: flexible thinking, managed emotions, and moderate behaviors. At High Conflict Institute we are developing an approach to do exactly this called “New Ways for Families.” It focuses on teaching these skills to both parents in a context of validation for both parents from the start of the case, rather than shame and blame for one or both. (For more on this method, see the article this month in our eNewsletter.)
Interestingly, the day I left Calgary, a front-page article on the newspaper told the end (perhaps) of the case involving the 18-year-old son. Apparently in December, his younger brothers had refused to go to the family counseling center in the U.S. and had been temporarily put into a psychiatric hospital, then into a foster home. Then, in the past two weeks, the 18-year-old helped his parents negotiate a settlement. He blamed the professionals for making the situation worse. So did many of the bloggers.
It’s time to recognize that HCPs need skills and not blame. They also needs lots of structure and consequences. But small consequences designed to keep them focused on their own skills, rather than the other’s bad behavior. Yes, in some cases larger consequences may be necessary for bad behavior – abuse and/or alienation. But let’s be clear first on whether we are doing more harm than good. In most cases we should first exhaust efforts to teach both parents these basic skills, before dramatically excluding either parent from their children’s lives. It’s time that professionals learned how to calm down and contain these disputes – as early as possible – so that we’re part of the solution, not part of the problem.
*News information for this article was gathered from March and April issues of the Canadian “Globe and Mail,” and the “National Post.”
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Can We Afford High Conflict Divorces in 2009?
According to news reports, on December 24, 2008, Bruce Pardo dressed up as Santa Claus and killed his soon-to-be ex-wife, her parents, and six other people at her parents’ home outside of
Most divorces don’t end this way. But in 2006, a survey of 131 family law attorneys in
In 2009, I am concerned that we are facing many stressors as a society: growing unemployment, growing home foreclosures, many troops returning from overseas with post-traumatic stress disorder, and more high conflict divorces. What is to be done?
This past year I attended a seminar on preventing youth mass murder, such as school shootings, shopping malls, etc. The presenter, James Garbardino, made a very powerful statement. He said that they can’t predict exactly who will commit a mass murder, but they have identified several factors that place a youth at high risk. Perhaps the key factor is whether there is at least one adult in the youth’s life who really cares about him – has a secure bond with him. This is a highly protective factor even for those who have many other risk factors. Having someone with a secure bond really seems to matter.
When people go through a divorce, some lose the most secure bond that they ever had – especially if they had an insecure childhood. This is no small event, even if it can be summed up in brief court papers to sound like a minor event. Add to that: loss of close contact with children and important relatives, loss of your income, loss of your house, and even loss of a beloved pet. Who can you turn to?
Current research shows that about 20% of the
So, where am I headed with all of this? I think there’s hope and opportunity for changing our divorce culture. Over the past several months, Megan Hunter and I and several others have been discussing a new approach to Family Court disputes over children, called “
Perhaps this secure bond approach can reduce the trauma of divorce and protect children from being at the center of a high conflict case – and protect them from developing personality disorders themselves. Recently, family courts have been told to be less adversarial and attorneys have been told be more civil. Let’s start out the New Year giving people hope, rather than taking it away.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Personality Disorders in the News
A new study was released Monday, December 1, in the publication, Archives of General Psychiatry. This study is the most extensive of its kind.
The article, ‘Personality Disorders Affecting Young Adults’, as reported by the Associated Press brings home the difficulties parents, instructors, friends and relatives face in dealing with college-age Americans with personality disorders. In America today, this study confirms one of five young American adults have a personality disorder that interferes with their everyday life. These problems show up in roommate or neighbor disputes, workplace disputes and family disputes. People with personality disorders can be extremely rigid and difficult, yet they generally have no awareness of how their behavior affects others or hurts themselves. All age groups have a percentage of people with personality disorders, but young people may have a higher percentage because of changes in society over the past few decades. It’s a serious problem and treatment can help.
Check out my book, It's All Your Fault! 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others For Everything for help dealing with people with high conflict personalities.
The article, ‘Personality Disorders Affecting Young Adults’, as reported by the Associated Press brings home the difficulties parents, instructors, friends and relatives face in dealing with college-age Americans with personality disorders. In America today, this study confirms one of five young American adults have a personality disorder that interferes with their everyday life. These problems show up in roommate or neighbor disputes, workplace disputes and family disputes. People with personality disorders can be extremely rigid and difficult, yet they generally have no awareness of how their behavior affects others or hurts themselves. All age groups have a percentage of people with personality disorders, but young people may have a higher percentage because of changes in society over the past few decades. It’s a serious problem and treatment can help.
Check out my book, It's All Your Fault! 12 Tips for Managing People Who Blame Others For Everything for help dealing with people with high conflict personalities.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Wall Street's Fault!
What a month! For the first three weeks of September, I was in Australia U.S.
Then, I flew to
First, Setting Limits (Part I): One of the key issues I study and teach is that high conflict people are risk-takers and they can’t stop themselves. Suddenly we, as a nation, are discovering that deregulation and other policies allowed some risk-takers to go too far. Whose fault is that? Well, who allowed deregulation to happen? Probably all of us, out of an eternal optimism and trust in others and trust in Wall Steet. And lack of knowledge of how high conflict people are increasing—and can’t stop themselves. The lesson learned? Hopefully, that WE need to keep setting limits so that the risk-takers who represent us financially and politically.
Second, Setting Limits (Part II): Congress is getting approval ratings these days around 15%. Whose fault is that? It seems to me that we have a choice every two years to provide consequences for many of those we elect, and our decisions can have a big impact on the rest. But who votes? Can’t blame that on Congress. WE need to set those limits on our politicians. We shouldn’t focus on blame. We should vote!
Interestingly, in
Third, Reality-Testing: It seems that we, as a nation, got caught up in believing in a housing and credit market that had no limits. What were WE thinking? It seems to me that we were told it couldn’t last, but wishful thinking took over. Of course, the media fed this wishful thinking. Lesson learned? WE have to keep our own expectations and dreams balanced by reality. And we need to stop paying as much attention to the images of more and larger and richer that we are bombarded with everyday.
Fourth, Empathy Attention and Respect: Most of all, rather than looking for who to blame (it’s not just THEM, and it’s not just US), we need to recognize that these are normal human problems. Brain research suggests that we like to blame others (it makes us feel good about ourselves when things go wrong), and that we like to put a human face on our complex problems (someone else’s, of course). So let’s have a little empathy for all of us. It’s normal to want more. It’s normal to want complete freedom to make money. The question is finding the right balance between individual risk-taking and selfishness, and society’s general well-being. We are always learning. We have incredible abilities to change course and learn from our mistakes. What policies need to be changed? What expectations need to be changed? Which decisions led to this? And what decisions will lead us out of this? Rather than focusing on Who’s to Blame for this mess in the past, I hope that we focus on learning what all of us can do differently in the future.
Fifth, Flexible Thinking: It is tempting to solve the problem of over-spending and over-extending by cutting back in an extreme manner—using “all-or-nothing thinking.” The world economy will stabilize when each of us stabilizes. This means that we shouldn’t panic and stop buying and stop contributing to the economy to protect ourselves individually. The biggest lesson of all, in my thinking, is that we need to stay connected to each other in these troubled times. Best wishes!
Monday, October 13, 2008
Narcissism and the Meltdown
I don’t know if you saw an Associated Press article in your newspaper last week (10/7/08) about a Los Angeles area married man who killed himself, his wife, his three children and his mother-in-law. He was unemployed, previously worked in the accounting industry and was despondent over his extreme financial difficulties. Apparently he left a suicide note saying he considered two options: just killing himself or killing his whole family. He reportedly chose to kill his whole family, because it was “more honorable.” (San Diego Union-Tribune, 10/7/08, p. A4)
Why would someone do this? And what can we do to help prevent this from happening more widely? Some ideas came together for me yesterday while speaking about high conflict personalities with 230 domestic violence professionals in the Chicago area. They had a powerful display of life-size figures of women who have been killed by their husbands/boyfriends and T-shirts with writing by children whose parents were killed. The danger of domestic violence is on their minds every day and their work is so important. I used the above example to explain ways to work with Narcissists.
First, Recognize Narcissism for what it is: an unconscious human defense mechanism. Narcissists are preoccupied with their public image, because their very shaky self-image is managed by trying to look superior in public. Images of wealth, having honorable status, trophy spouses, children in the best schools, etc. often help narcissists cope with a deep underlying sense of powerlessness and inadequacy. When the public image is shattered, many narcissists cannot cope. Some become violent toward others, often those closest to them, who they blame for their own problems in their distorted and dangerous thinking. Others blame themselves. In either case, violence becomes a much higher risk.
Second, Narcissism is Widespread: Researchers indicate that each younger generation has become more and more self-centered and narcissistic over the past 50 years (and this seems to be worldwide). A very recent national study in the U.S. (Stinson, et al, Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, July 2008) determined that over 6% of our population meets the criteria for a narcissistic personality disorder. This means that over 18 million people in the U.S. may appear normal, but are stuck in a self-centered, self-defeating dysfunctional cycle of thinking, feeling and acting.
Third, There Need to be Consequences: Narcissists can’t stop themselves, whether it’s domestic violence or greed. However, when they know that there is a strong enough negative consequence, they will restrain their behavior. That’s what we just learned about Wall Street with insufficient regulations, and that’s what we know about domestic violence reoccurring when there aren’t strong legal consequences, like jail time.
Fourth, Don’t Diss the Narcissists: Taking a chapter title from my new book (“It’s All YOUR Fault!”), it is very important to resist the urge to criticize obviously narcissistic people when their fortunes turn sour. Resist the urge to say I told you so, and resist the urge to say Now look at you, Mr. Big Shot. DON’T tell people you think they are narcissistic. It might hurt you in the long run. Instead, give them your E.A.R.: Your EMPATHY (not sympathy—empathy means you can have similar feelings and frustrations), a little ATTENTION, and RESPECT them for their efforts and positive qualities as a person.
Fifth, You’re Not Alone: One of the surprising things about this financial meltdown is that it is worldwide and will affect everyone. No one individual is solely to blame for this (although those who have significant responsibility should have appropriate legal and financial consequences). We need to stick together. We need to let others know that we care and want them to know that there is more to living than making money. Perhaps the silver lining in all of this is that we will discover that we can care for people more than money after all!
Why would someone do this? And what can we do to help prevent this from happening more widely? Some ideas came together for me yesterday while speaking about high conflict personalities with 230 domestic violence professionals in the Chicago area. They had a powerful display of life-size figures of women who have been killed by their husbands/boyfriends and T-shirts with writing by children whose parents were killed. The danger of domestic violence is on their minds every day and their work is so important. I used the above example to explain ways to work with Narcissists.
First, Recognize Narcissism for what it is: an unconscious human defense mechanism. Narcissists are preoccupied with their public image, because their very shaky self-image is managed by trying to look superior in public. Images of wealth, having honorable status, trophy spouses, children in the best schools, etc. often help narcissists cope with a deep underlying sense of powerlessness and inadequacy. When the public image is shattered, many narcissists cannot cope. Some become violent toward others, often those closest to them, who they blame for their own problems in their distorted and dangerous thinking. Others blame themselves. In either case, violence becomes a much higher risk.
Second, Narcissism is Widespread: Researchers indicate that each younger generation has become more and more self-centered and narcissistic over the past 50 years (and this seems to be worldwide). A very recent national study in the U.S. (Stinson, et al, Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, July 2008) determined that over 6% of our population meets the criteria for a narcissistic personality disorder. This means that over 18 million people in the U.S. may appear normal, but are stuck in a self-centered, self-defeating dysfunctional cycle of thinking, feeling and acting.
Third, There Need to be Consequences: Narcissists can’t stop themselves, whether it’s domestic violence or greed. However, when they know that there is a strong enough negative consequence, they will restrain their behavior. That’s what we just learned about Wall Street with insufficient regulations, and that’s what we know about domestic violence reoccurring when there aren’t strong legal consequences, like jail time.
Fourth, Don’t Diss the Narcissists: Taking a chapter title from my new book (“It’s All YOUR Fault!”), it is very important to resist the urge to criticize obviously narcissistic people when their fortunes turn sour. Resist the urge to say I told you so, and resist the urge to say Now look at you, Mr. Big Shot. DON’T tell people you think they are narcissistic. It might hurt you in the long run. Instead, give them your E.A.R.: Your EMPATHY (not sympathy—empathy means you can have similar feelings and frustrations), a little ATTENTION, and RESPECT them for their efforts and positive qualities as a person.
Fifth, You’re Not Alone: One of the surprising things about this financial meltdown is that it is worldwide and will affect everyone. No one individual is solely to blame for this (although those who have significant responsibility should have appropriate legal and financial consequences). We need to stick together. We need to let others know that we care and want them to know that there is more to living than making money. Perhaps the silver lining in all of this is that we will discover that we can care for people more than money after all!
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